


envy the country that has heroes

by ideal_girl (trainwreckdress)



Category: Reign of Fire
Genre: Apocalypse, Backstory, Dragons, M/M, Yuletide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-01-01
Updated: 2009-01-01
Packaged: 2017-10-02 20:57:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,933
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10649
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trainwreckdress/pseuds/ideal_girl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What becomes of a hero?</p>
            </blockquote>





	envy the country that has heroes

Three days before the start of Michealmas, Quinn's dad stops coming around. Not that Quinn misses him much, not like he was really there, anyway. Head in his newspaper, fingers on his pager, lips wrapped around a cigarette, always telling Mum that this time, this time, he'd get it. This was the time he'd get it right and make enough money to set them up -- nice flat with a garden for her, a boat on a local slip for him, and public school for the boy, scholarship be damned.

His dad would make noises about how it just wasn't natural for a boy that young to be working that hard, to care that much about his letters and numbers. _Should be off in a scrum,_ he'd say, _getting up to something with the other lads._ He'd ruffle Quinn's hair, hand too heavy against the curve of skull, fingers too sharp at the temples, the stench of tobacco lingering on his skin. _Not asking all sorts of smartarse questions and reading books thicker than his hand. Not my boy._

(Quinn took to reading at night, under the covers with a flashlight that he pilfered from his mum's work. His dad didn't seem to notice, but he did lay off a bit.)

So when his dad leaves, Quinn thinks maybe he should be feeling like his world is crashing down -- after all, it's his dad, and a boy needs his father, needs a hero, someone to look up to. He looks down and nods when the old lady across the hall offers up her sympathy, lets her ply him with cookies and takes her rubbish out to the skip in exchange for a 50-pence piece.

He saves up until he's got enough to buy a new book bag. The one he's got isn't big enough.

*

His dad shows up months later -- it's a random Saturday in the dead of the summer. Quinn's been at the library all morning, reading Tolkien in front of a struggling air conditioner. He opens the front door, keys banging against the wood, there's his dad, sacked out on the couch, telly tuned to cricket, a tea cup acting as a makeshift ashtray. The room smells of smoke, and Quinn swallows down a cough, shifting the strap of his bag on his shoulder, his skin near cutting from the weight of books.

"Oi!" his dad shouts out, waving him over like he never left. Like his last season departure was planned -- scheduled like you schedule a holiday. Quinn smells liquor from across the room. He doesn't move. "Come 'ere, boy, get your dad that paper over there, yeah?" Another cigarette flares to life, pointing the way. "Come on now, get movin', all that schoolin' short out your brain or summat?"

"That's right." But Quinn does as he's told, scoops up the mess of newsprint and hands it over. He turns away, bag slapping his thighs, wanting nothing more than to be away from the smell.

His dad laughs, a terrible braying noise. "Don't scoff, got lots of money set up against Dravid and his heroics tonight. It's in your best interest to watch and learn." He's looking at Quinn carefully now, eyes narrowed and searching. "Somebody's gotta pay for that public school shite, yeah?"

His dad's gone when Quinn wakes up in the morning -- in and out like Marvelman, no unsuspecting innocents the wiser. In his place, there's a thousand pounds in the ice box and a burn mark on the left arm of the sofa.

*

Three days after his mother dies, Quinn wakes up alone in a hospital room. He can't see (eyes taped shut to heal from the acid), and he can't speak (throat burned from the flames). He sits there, quietly, until he hears the shuffle of papers in the room. He raises his hand and gives his visitor quite a start.

Then there's a lot of shouting, something about him being awake, and praising a god that Quinn knows now doesn't exist. People stream in and out of his room, words and snatches of phrases going through him.

Someone presses a cup in his hand, and a straw tickles his upper lip. _Brave little lad_ \-- he drinks deeply. _His mum, there, she's the real hero, got him out, didn't she?_ \-- he coughs up most of it, pushes the cup away. He falls back against the pillows, the rough press of rough fingers against his neck, his wrists.

His mum is dead. He knows this, felt her turn cold under his hands, even though he couldn't see her lifeless body.

That's the largest small favor the universe grants him for the next five years.

He gets his eyesight back by the end of that first week, and wishes he hadn't. London is burnt at the core, singed on the edges.

His dad doesn't come to pick him up. A kindly orderly takes pity on Quinn, sneaks him out into the sewers under the hospital in the dead of night. Quinn's got a pack stuffed with food for a week and the clothes on his back. _Save yourself,_ the man had said. _Don't be a hero, just go._

So, he did.

*

"Remember when we first met?" Creedy asks him once, both of them drunk as fuck on whatever was left in their flasks, sprawled out on the floor of a basement somewhere just south of Staines.

"No." Quinn pauses, feels the tilt of the world through the soles of his shoes, thanks to the spectacularly awful booze, and starts laughing. "I fucking don't, how awful is that?"

Creedy's fingers are cold against Quinn's stomach as they dig in, his lips upturned while Quinn continues to guffaw, bucking upward with each jab. "You've got no romance in you, Quinn, none at all." Creedy continues to berate Quinn and his English lineage, his voice rising and falling with Quinn's hips, laughter echoing off the slab walls.

Something crashes, close enough that they hear it, far enough that it doesn't shake the ground. They stop, drained of mirth. Creedy's palms are tight against the thin skin covering Quinn's ribs, fingers flexing.

There's a moment, a beat where they could've moved away, should've moved away. They don't. Quinn pushes up and Creedy presses down, and there's a delicious slide of skin and denim and wool.

"What was that?" Quinn swallows hard, his chest rising against Creedy's. He feels the room spin, hopes it's just the drink and not a dragon swallowing them up.

Creedy's hands slide away, leaving Quinn's stomach cold. Palms flat on the floor, Creedy's forearms bracket Quinn's chest.

"I dunno."

A whoosh of air, much closer, and Barlow scuffles down the steps, his hair windswept and eyes wild.

"Gotta go, boys, the RAF is growing mushrooms in the sky. Bunch of feckin' heroes, that lot."

*

The morning after the night they find Jared, Quinn wakes up to Creedy pressed up against his back, their thin blankets and thick jackets telegraphing every movement of their bodies. Barlow is already tending the fire, the flames letting loose dry heat across the drafty stone structure.

Creedy's voice is pitched low, his breathing still even as if in sleep. "We can't take the boy with us, he won't make it. _We_ won't make it. Can't be a hero if you're dead."

Quinn pauses, his eyes open to the darkness, his vision colored at the edges by the flames. "We have to, and we are." End of discussion.

A sigh, and then Creedy relaxes, his fists digging Quinn's side, the press dulled by his gloves. "You're a right bastard."

"You've got that half right."

Jared stirs and Quinn goes to him.

*

"Did you want children?"

"Never thought about it, didn't really have time."

"Yeah, there's that. Do you want them now?"

"No, wouldn't want to bring them into this world, alone."

"You're not alone, you've got me."

"Yeah, but what if one day you're just not there."

"Then you'll know what to do."

"And what is that?"

"Fuck if I know."

Silence rings in Quinn's ears. Creedy shifts, disrupting the quiet.

"Not going anywhere, anyway."

*

They find the castle by mistake - someone has a cousin who has a friend who got married there once, years and years ago. (_"Before the end, of course." "Of course."_) No one in their right mind would get married now, not when everything is over. No point. (_"Just shag and shag alike._" Quinn thinks the speaker of that particular bon mot won't last very long.)

They come up over the crest of the hill, grey stone on black earth. It looks abandoned, rundown, left to the elements, because it is and was.

No one speaks. Quinn takes a deep breath, his lungs aching from the journey through smoke and fog. "I've always wanted to live in the country."

A pause, a hiccup in sound. Creedy huffs. "No, you didn't."

"No, I didn't."

They laugh, perhaps too long and too hard. Barlow stomps off with a mutter about _"feckin' heroes, this lot, how'd they made it this far--"_

"Home, though, right? Done walking?" Jared wilts against Quinn, burrows into the folds of his coat.

Quinn looks down, tousles the small boy's hair. " For now."

*

"James Bond?"

Quinn can hear the smile on Creedy's face, even if he can't see it. They're on watch, dead of night, the moon dulled by the ever-present smoke clouds.

"No, why? So you can play Connery and what's left for me? Bloke with steel teeth? A doctor with a fondness for cats? That's a fucking terrible idea." Quinn hisses, stomps his feet to get the blood flowing. The nights are getting colder and colder. He makes a mental note to trade for some new socks. "And before you even suggest it, I am not playing Pussy Galore."

"Was thinking you'd be a perfect Stromberg, actually."

"He's a madman, Bond kills him. You want me to die, Creedy?"

"No." A beat. "Here to save you, you know that."

*

Quinn's been in a foul mood for weeks; can't shake it. The others give him a wide berth, eyes wide at his furious scribbling as he takes notes and cross-checks and references as much as he can about the beasts. Creedy takes to sleeping elsewhere -- his bed dusty and sometimes filled by one of the young ones who can't shake the nightmares.

Creedy corners him one day, as he's working on the plans for the new fire suppressant system, paper crinkling under his fingers. He pushes at Quinn, yanks at his strings until they're both shouting and the workroom is empty. Quinn's hands are tangled in Creedy's sweater, their noses practically touching as they spill invective all over each other.

A breath, and Quinn's vision clears. He shakes himself out of Creedy's grip, collapses onto a stool. He speaks, because he's too tired to do anything else.

"One day, you're going to die, and it's going to be because of me." Quinn doesn't look up, just closes his eyes, wishes he couldn't see Creedy's face.

"What the--is this what you've been on about?" Creedy start-stops, his boots scuffing against the floor. "What's wrong with that, huh? Dying for you? Heroes' death, it is."

Quinn digs his fingers into his temples, finally gathers enough courage to look up. He hasn't cried since London - no time, no energy. He thinks he might now, spill tears to put out this fire. "Heroes don't die, Creedy."

Creedy smiles -- actually _smiles_ \-- and claps him on the shoulder with a firm hand. "Ah, there's where you're wrong. That's what heroes do, Quinn. They die."

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Yuletide 2008, for curiouslyfic. Thank you, M'lyn, for a well placed kick in the pants. Anything obtuse and/or ridiculous left is mine and mine alone. (Story title is a quote from the movie.)


End file.
